NOVEMBER 2010
Sunday 2010.11.28
Food and Friends
Sitting at a Thanksgiving dining room table surrounded by friends during this past week's holiday reminded me what cooking food is for. It's for eating, yes, but it is also for the people who will eat it. Animals have food, and I think dog food and cat food are cooked (sometimes I wonder...). We might think we act out of love when we buy food for our pets, and we probably enjoy cooking something special for them occasionally. I have memories of cooking the giblets that were packaged inside the chicken for our little dog. He loved them. We love our friends, however, more than we love our pets.
Thursday afternoon was an enjoyable and relaxing time for conversation, champagne, and food. Everyone was generous with their hugs, their laughter, and their amusing stories. The food, as it is every year, was fantastic. Someone who was not in attendance owns goats and they sent goat cheese they made themselves. Someone prepared green beans cooked with sliced almonds. One person made two different kinds of cranberry sauce, a cooked and a raw version. Another brought two homemade pies, one apple and one pumpkin. I brought almond biscotti that I made that morning. And, of course, there was the roasted turkey with stuffing, mashed potatoes, and plenty of gravy. The hostess, who is one of the most delightful women I know, sent each of us home with a thoughtful gift, whether we brought food or not.
It was an exquisitely delightful meeting of people who joined together to share and enjoy food and friendship. I can best describe my feelings afterward as a special kind of satisfaction. Being satisfied with food is certainly a part of it, but hunger can just as easily be sated with pizza as it can with a fine turkey dinner. It's the satisfying feeling of knowing that one has special friends who deserve to be appreciated not only for their generosity and pleasant personality, but also for the many ways in which they also express their appreciation. Simply put, it's love. And that we express our love for each other throughout the year, rather than on only one calendar day, is something for which to be truly thankful. Thank you, my friends, for making my life richer and more satisfying.
Wednesday 2010.11.24
Working Alone
I continue to learn (through mistakes) how to shoot my own videos. Because of the battery problems mentioned in the last blog entry I had to reshoot some of the custard pie segments. That's when I learned more about lighting. We always turn off the overhead fluorescent light and shoot with focused halogen lamps hidden behind silks around the kitchen. Some of my shots looked green and I couldn't figure out why. Oops again. I forgot to turn off that overhead light. Supposedly there are ways to correct the color temperature in post-processing, but I was done. A few of the segments were shot a third time and then I went out with what I had. Perfection isn't possible while working through a learning curve.
There is always a silver lining though. When Eric is behind the camera I tend to mumble occasionally while I'm cooking. I think it's because I don't need to think about the video and I can simply concentrate on the task of cooking. Immersed in my cooking, I sometimes talk to myself. Thus the mumbling. I then need to adjust the entire audio track while editing, which adds about an hour to the post-processing work. After doing my own video I noticed all my speech is loud and clear. No mumbling.
There is something to look forward to as well. At the request of Doug, a fan of this site, I did a video demonstrating how to sharpen knives, specifically the workhorse knife of the kitchen, the chef's knife. I keep my knives super sharp and I am the only person allowed to sharpen a friend's knife (nice vote of confidence there). So hopefully you will find the video useful. It will be edited this week and hopefully make it to the web site by the weekend. I'll be adding a new button in the left panel, "Procedures," where I also hope to post a video on how to clarify butter, among other things. I'll probably move the How To Bone A Chicken PDF and video to the new Procedures page as well.
Sunday 2010.11.21
The Good, The Bad, and the Not Thoroughly Cooked
Not every day can be wonderful. Today started off great. In fact, it was fantastic. My video guy, Eric, left his camera with me and showed me how to use it. This morning I did my own vidoe of Custard Pie. The really cool thing was the remote control. After setting up the camera and framing my shot, I could control the camera from the kitchen. Everything went well until I started reviewing some of the videos. Uh-oh. The batteries had died in the lavalier microphone. No audio. Some scenes could be dubbed over, but how do you dub the sound of a food processor? "Brooooooorrrrrr." Not quite.
Then the pie came out of the oven too soon. Along the edge it was cooked, but after cutting into it the filling started to drool. As I write this the pie is sitting in the microwave oven, which is running on high for ten minutes. I can't make it any worse. Wanna bet? I just checked it. The filling is bubbling and it's sort of collapsing into itselt, like it's on its way to becoming a sink hole. Thank goodness I have a sense of humor.
I think there is nothing left to do but make myself a tall Kahlúa and cream. If I had apple juice I'd make myself a white trash martini (whiskey and apple juice on the rocks). I do believe we learn from our mistakes, and today was full of valuable lessons.
Tomorrow is another day. I am home all this week, so I will attempt another custard pie video. I learned enough about the camera today to hopefully pull off a successful attempt tomorrow.
Wednesday 2010.11.17
Thankful
The fact that I am writing this Blog entry on this computer (named Computer2—I don't give my computers cute names) is proof positive that it has recovered from its virus attack. Really, time and patience was all that was needed to reload it back to a healthy state. I decided to protect this one from further attack by setting it aside as purely a production computer. No more downloading. No more Internet surfing. Keep it off line until it is necessary to post something. Upload, and then get out. I even created a shortcut for my Device Manager and loaded that into the Startup folder. Now, whenever I boot this computer, my Device Manager opens and shows me the Ethernet connections are disabled.
As next week is Thanksgiving week here in the USA, I'm thinking of cooking something Chinese. It makes no sense, I know. Thanksgiving is a day for turkey with stuffing, cranberry jelly (I hate the god-awful stuff), Aunt Jessica's green bean casserole made with French fried onions and cream of mushroom soup (you know what I'm talking about), and dessert of pumpkin pie (something that causes people in other countries to wonder about us Americans). Therefore, Chinese food seems appropriate in a skewed sort of way.
My camera guy, Eric, wants to experiment with rack of lamb. We're researching recipes now.
If all goes according to plan I will likely upload my recipe for Chicken and Snow Peas on Sunday. Chinese food seems to be more about the sauces than the chopping. I know plenty of you like to swirl chopped vegetables around in a wok and call it stir-fry. I'm more about the flavor of the sauces. So I am going to open this up to recommendations. If you know how to make excellent sauces, in the tradition of Chinese-American cooking, please use the Contact page to suggest some recipes. I'll give you credit if I can use them in a recipe. If you have no objection to leaving your email address (it will not be used for spam, I promise) please do so, as I might have questions.
I have some sauce recipes of my own. I brought a little jar to an Asian restaurant one day and ordered Chicken and Cashews. I poured the leftover sauce from my plate into the jar and took it home to experiment. I'll post that recipe soon. I make a lighter sauce, not so laden with salt and oil, and the result is delicious.
As for Thanksgiving, in the venerable tradition of the holiday I declare that I do have something for which to be thankful. This computer is working well again. Praise technology!
Sunday 2010.11.14
Virus Attack
I'm not usually upset when one of my computers gets trashed by a virus attack. I reload each of my computers at least once a year anyway. But this time around proved more frustrating than usual. I'm still trying to get problems sorted out and I'm limping along between two computers just to keep this site updated. I have good virus protection software, but nothing is guaranteed to work perfectly all of the time.
On the bright side, I believe my Smoked Salmon Quiche recipe is finally ready to be released to the public. I made it five times to get the flavors balanced correctly. You can, of course, modify any of the amounts if you prefer a stronger flavor of smoked salmon or of Gruyère cheese. For the sixth test I brought the quiche into work for a potluck. It was the first plate emptied, an indicator that people really liked it. I received some compliments as well.
For the seventh attempt I made the quiche for the YouTube video. My camera guy and I then sat down to Smoked Salmon Quiche, fresh Brie, a French baguette, and a bottle of Syrah wine.
The baguette was sliced down the middle, buttered, spread with Brie, and then heated in a warm oven. It was a thoroughly enjoyable repast. If you're wondering about the outtake at the end of the video, that's my camera guy holding out his glass, wanting another Kahlúa and cream (which I am sipping at the moment).
As for the computer, it will eventually come together. It's like a puzzle to be solved. The fact that I build my own computers helps, in that I know how to load a computer and get it set up the way I like. I will have all of next week free, so there will be plenty of time to perfect the computer, just as I perfected the quiche.
Wednesday 2010.11.10
Flavors On My Mind
Since my experiment with pesto on Sunday (adding oil-cured Italian olives to the pesto while in the food processor) I've had the delicious thought of that pesto in my mind.
When I am teaching someone to cook, one thought I try to emphasize is the practice of cataloging flavors in the mind. Not everyone can do it, but if you can you are on your way to creating your own recipes. I can give an example: When I first tasted shallots that were cooked until caramelized I thought, "This is a flavor that would go well with clams." I then created my own recipe for Linguine With Clam Sauce." Experiment. Unless you're taking chances with rare Russian caviar, you are probably not going to toss a month's salary into the trash. Monday evening I was about to hurl a ball of pie dough into the trash and then I thought, "You can save this by adding butter." It worked.
I can't explain what made me think (or realize) that olives would work well in pesto. That's part of the mystery of creativity when cooking. Maybe I read about olives and pesto in a cookbook and it stuck in my mind without my realizing it.
How do we really know which flavors will work together? Lately I've been working on Smoked Salmon Quiche. After making it five times I felt I had the right balance of flavors. I then "beta tested" it by bringing it to a potluck yesterday morning. It was a success. I never saw a recipe for this quiche, although I'm sure there are plenty out there. One day I just thought smoked salmon would taste good in a quiche.
I tell people to taste ingredients (that are safe to taste, of course—you wouldn't want to sample raw chicken) and try to store a sense memory of the flavor. Imagine how that flavor might work with other flavors. There is nothing about the flavor of Gruyère cheese that suggests it might be used with vanilla custard, but with smoked salmon? There's an idea. The purpose of cataloging flavors in the mind is that you might taste something some day and think, "Hmmm. This would taste good with..." That's where it all begins. You might also be able to taste something and list the ingredients.
Thanksgiving is arriving soon here in the USA. I've already got stale bagels in the freezer and I'm exploring flavors in my mind for the stuffing. I'll let you know what I come up with, even if it all ends up in the trash.
Sunday 2010.11.7
Running
I was wondering what I was going to blog about today, and then yesterday provided an event. The main thoroughfare in front of my home was closed down yesterday morning at 6:00, not to reopen until 9:00. The marathon was running through the neighborhood and I had to get to the store to buy eggplant.
Thankfully I live within walking distance of the store. At first only two guys ran by and I wondered it maybe our local marathon wasn't very popular. Then a few more, then the masses, gazillions of runners of all ages and in all shapes and sizes. It was exciting as I walked by them on my way to the store, and on the way back as well. It isn't a short walk; so I'm glad I ride my bicycle to work everyday. I don't have the legs nor the stamina of a marathon runner (I might be able to keep pace with them from one driveway to the next, and that would be the end for me), but I'm healthier than most people my age.
They had a good day for their run. It was cloudy and cool, almost dark from the clouds. The day was threatening rain, but not until the afternoon. The temperature was projected to rise no higher than 69°F (20°C). I'm not a runner, but with my limited knowledge those seem like ideal conditions to me.
As for the eggplant, I made eggplant parmesan. The recipe is in the Recipe Archive. We had hoped to video the preparation, but circumstances made that impossible. We were, however, able to video my famous Pesto Lamb. I had to buy two legs and prepare one in advance on Friday evening because it needs to sit in the refrigerator overnight. I prepared the second leg in front of the camera yesterday and put it in the refrigerator. Meanwhile, the finished product was in the oven, waiting to be revealed to the camera when done.
Necessity is the mother of invention and I had to do some inventing this time. I didn't have enough pine nuts to prep two legs; so I used toasted almonds instead for the Friday prep. I also added about 20 oil-cured Italian olives to the pesto and more garlic than usual. (For the video I made traditional pesto.) The invention turned out very well.
Experimentation when an ingredient is missing sometimes leads to a better recipe. Don't be afraid to experiment when the cost is minimal and when the meal is not important. You wouldn't want to serve a failure to special guests. Even a failure that ends up in the trash is not a total loss. It's an important lesson learned.
Wednesday 2010.11.3
Knives
A local kitchenware store offers free knife sharpening every Thanksgiving season, to prepare knives for carving the turkey. The employees are college kids, who know about as much about knives as I know about astrophysics. The "sharpener" is an electric thing you slide the knife through. There is usually no quality control to make certain the curve of a chef's knife is correctly maintained. I recommend taking in your carving knife, but bring your chef's knife to somone you trust to sharpen it properly.
When it comes to my kitchen knives, I have attitude. I got lucky with my chef's knife. It's a 9-inch Henckels Professional-S, no longer available. This was a model made for the U.S. market and was discontinued. There was one on Ebay and I bid $60 on it. I was out-bid by less than a dollar. However, the seller e-mailed me to say he had another one, new in box, that I could have for my $60 bid. I said yes.
I use a 600-grit diamond hone to keep my blades sharp. (I actually have two—my best one never leaves the house.) A sharpening steel (those cylindrical round sharpeners that typically come with a set of knives) is okay for putting a quick edge on a blade, but if you don't know what you're doing you can ruin a knife. Even "professional" sharpeners can ruin a blade. This happenend to a friend of mine. His father took his chef's knife to be professionally sharpened and it came back more like a carving knife, a shallow "S" curve to the blade. A chef's knife must have one curve such that every bit of the cutting edge comes into contact with the cutting board as you rock the knife from tip to heel against the board. No gaps. When he brought the knife to me, out came the Dremel and the diamond hone and I spent about an hour reshaping the blade until I properly restored it.
I have a knife block for my most-used blades. Other knives—less used but just as important—are stored in leather sheafs I made and placed in a drawer. Even my 9-inch has its own leather sheath, which I use whenever I carry my knife anywhere.
Good quality knives are expensive. Don't spend the money if you're not going to take care of them. If you're willing to part with the bucks for a high quality blade, learn to care for it properly. Don't put the knife in a dishwasher, even though the label might say it is dishwasher safe. "Safe" does not mean "advisable." Wash your knives by hand and dry them immediately. Store them in a knife block or a sheath, not tossed in a utensils drawer. I slide my knives into my knife block upside-down, with the sharp part of the blade pointing upward so that the back, or spine, of the blade slides against the wood as the knife moves into or out of the knife block slot.
When it comes to sharpening a knife, learn how to do it yourself or take it to a reputable knife sharpener. As mentioned above, an unqualified knife sharpener can ruin a knife.